Technology

Mindful technologies can help assisted living and long-term care achieve the promise of a happy healthy engaged post retirement. Understanding our elders weather, they are in a memory care, nursing care or residential care is the key to creating an environment that anticipates their needs and communicates that information to staff and family.

BIP Technologies, a sister company has been working on a mobile application that is easy to use for the staff and Families. BIP (Belonging, Influence and Purpose) evolved from Elite Care Technologies one of the first companies dealing with long term care and how programs and applications can better life for the elders. As the name suggest facilitating graceful aging is about creating information and communication that helps elders Belong while maintaining their Influence and Purpose to the end of life. Early in the program’s development we focused on hardware pre IOT that could improve the lives of elders. We were most interested in how the information coming from hardware devices could improve care by understanding unmet needs. In this quest we received several patents on how the hardware could act as an assisting device in care. Learning from our endeavors we have slowly move more into a software solution. Understanding the environment and motion in that environment is important. What is most important is understanding the emotional needs of the elders and supporting those needs through constant feedback.

A transformational change is going to happen in the next generation as Boomers and Generation Xers become more active in their own care and what they are going to except. Technology should not be used to create a better box to hold the elders in but as an assistive device that enhances and supports their wellbeing.

Post retirement care is about transforming care, especially towards the end of life, from one where the medical community is paramount to a more traditional wellness/life model where we call upon all stakeholders to participate and use the medical community primarily for event/accident care. For this to work the software platform has to be able to link all stakeholders together acting in uniform. When care is not consistent elders suffer from emotional duress and stress brought about constantly changing set of expectations by different stakeholders.

The key to keeping elders is to catch changes in their condition very early and address those changes with more traditional approaches. To catch pneumonia when it is just a cold, to catch the cold when you become chilled or you are not getting enough nutrients(a decrease in immunity system). To reduce the cognitive load of our demented elders before it becomes anxiety that leads to emotional breakdown and additional decline in ability to handle cognitive loads. It should be noted in our RCFs/ALFs we are not allowed to give medical care. So the emphases has to be put not on treatment but on prevention. Prevention is about understanding the elder and their needs and weaving into that information the capacities of the environment help fill those needs.

Communication-Making sure everybody is able to have an avenue to communicate their observations, concerns and thoughts.

Collaboration- Making sure that everybody is being honored for their input, that it is heard and that solutions are a cohesive group effort. Especially in elders who have cognitive challenges when we send mixed messages it confuses, marginalizes and creates massive amount of stress.

Coordination- everybody needs to be able to have surety in their actions and confidence that they are doing the right thing at the right time.

Clarity- Understanding what is happening, what course of action I need to take, when I should get additional help(Direction) and what are the potential outcomes for my actions.

Transparency-Everybody acts better when they are on stage. When your actions are viewed by all stake holders everybody tends to (DWYSYWD) Do What You Say You Will Do.

Under the surface our program is meant to alter behavior by placing emphasis on what data we collect, how we collect it and how we inform all stakeholders of this information. The way we write/code the program, the language we use and how and what data we collect is meant to change the mind set from waiting for a major event to occur to wellness, quality of life and graceful endings.

The industry talks about the need for a transformational change from a medical model to a social model, yet they are trying to do this in a medical framework. When the family is empowered to tend and care for the elderly they do it with energy, dedication and time that can only be driven by relationships. When lay stakeholders are given the tools and responsibility to be an integral part of a multidisciplinary team they meet the challenge. It is our goal to give people the tools and clarity of what and when things need to be done in small enough chucks that they are wildly successful. It is our mission to change the conversation from intervention and quantity of medical care to wellness and quality of life.

Our android app collects vital information, how they are doing what they are doing and what they want, about the resident from the caregiver in real time and then pushes that information to the appropriate party. We also use it to help create a Simple Consistent Routine environment that encourages love and care. [Gabe Video Clip]